Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Monday that Washington and Beijing had struck a "framework for a TikTok deal," days before another deadline that could have banned the popular social media app in the United States.
Bessent offered few details about the agreement. On a key sticking point about who would control TikTok's algorithm, which dictates what users see on the app, he said: “We’re not going to talk about the commercial terms of the deal. It’s between two private parties, but the commercial terms have been agreed upon.”
He did not indicate which parties he was referring to.
“We were very focused on TikTok and making sure that it was a deal that is fair for the Chinese and completely respects U.S. national security concerns, and that’s the deal we reached,” Bessent said. He added that the United States wanted to “ensure that the Chinese have a fair investment environment in the United States but always that U.S. national security comes first.”
Bessent spoke from Madrid, where he was meeting with a Chinese delegation to discuss ongoing trade tensions between the two superpowers. Just before his remarks, China announced it had found computer chip giant Nvidia in violation of its antitrust laws over a 2020 deal.
Chinese Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang confirmed the two sides reached a “basic framework consensus properly resolving TikTok-related issues through cooperative means, reducing investment barriers, and promoting relevant economic and trade cooperation,” according to Xinhua, China’s state-run news agency.
President Donald Trump posted Monday on Truth Social that an agreement had been reached over a "company that young people in our Country very much wanted to save." He added that he would be speaking to Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday.
Trump and Vice President JD Vance, who has been a key player in the White House's TikTok strategy, spoke to Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Sunday about the framework deal, a White House official told NBC News.
"President Trump and Vice President Vance provided the leadership and foresight necessary to produce a framework deal that fulfills another campaign promise and saves TikTok. Hundreds of millions of Americans will now be able to continue safely enjoying the highly popular app thanks to the President’s decisive leadership," a spokesperson for Vance said.
Vance’s counsel played an important part in the Madrid talks, as well, a White House official said.
TikTok did not respond to a request for comment.
TikTok has remained in legal limbo over a U.S. law that threatened to ban it unless it was sold to a non-Chinese buyer. It has continued to operate despite a 2024 law subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court that forced its Chinese owner, ByteDance, to sell it to a U.S.-based company or face steep penalties for continuing to operate in the United States. The law had bipartisan support in Congress when it passed because of concerns about privacy and national security for the app's more than 170 million U.S.-based users.
The app was briefly shuttered in the United States just days before Trump’s inauguration — but Trump promised not to impose penalties on TikTok after he was sworn in, while ByteDance worked to find a U.S.-based buyer.
Upon coming into office, he made that promise official with an executive order that he has extended several times, most recently in June. The most recent extension is scheduled to expire Wednesday.
As the extensions have piled up, so have potential U.S.-based bidders for the app. They included, at various points, venture capital group Andreessen Horowitz, Amazon, asset management firm Blackstone and tech giant Oracle, whose co-founder Larry Ellison, is a close Trump ally.
One of TikTok's current U.S. investors, Jeffrey Yass, spent millions in 2024 on lobbying to protect the app from being shut down. At 7%, Yass' share of TikTok was worth as much as $21 billion last year.
NBC News reported in July that Yass had donated $16 million to Trump's super PAC, sending MAGA Inc. $1 million days before Trump’s inauguration and $15 million more in early March.
Trump moved to ban TikTok in the United States during his first term, but he has spoken about it favorably in his second term, crediting it with helping him win over key groups of young voters in the 2024 presidential election.
On Friday, in an interview on Fox News’ “Fox and Friends,” Trump spoke about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk at an event Wednesday.
“A Republican never wins youth, but I won youth. I will tell you, TikTok helped me, but [Kirk] helped me with TikTok, but he helped me with youth,” Trump said.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick last week also spoke about a possible ban of the platform, highlighting Trump’s positive feelings toward it while also weighing his concerns.
“The president likes TikTok. You know, he did well communicating with young people through TikTok. So he’s partial to it,” Lutnick told CNBC.
“But unless it’s owned by Americans and the algorithm is controlled by Americans — because, you know, eventually that app in your phone, everything with China has a call daddy in it,” Lutnick said. “So the president knows, if we’re going to have TikTok here, that’s got to go.”
He added: “If the president can get that, he’s going to keep TikTok. If you can’t, it’s going to go dark.”
